


Weird Old Bones

by Kiraly



Category: Stand Still Stay Silent
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, First Dates, Kissing, Museums
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 18:27:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17565713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kiraly/pseuds/Kiraly
Summary: The crew has to stop for repairs, and the scouting group finds something interesting. Sigrun takes Tuuri out to see it.





	Weird Old Bones

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Elleth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elleth/gifts).



> Happy Chocolate Box, Elleth! I saw your prompt about this and immediately thought "Oh, that's perfect". Hope you will enjoy!

It had been a long, frustrating morning of repairs for Tuuri. She  _ knew  _ she was the only one who could get the tank working again, and knew the others had important work to do too. But it was hard not to feel put-upon as she emerged, with grease up to her elbows, and heard the scouting party return from exploring. She knew whose job was more exciting.

So she kept her head down and fiddled with the engine, tracing through the tangle of wires and tubes one more time to make sure everything connected. She was sure it would start, it  _ had  _ to this time, but—

“Hey there, Fuzzy-head!” Sigrun ruffled her hair and slung an arm around her shoulders. “How’s it looking? Are we gonna be able to drive out of here tomorrow?”

Tuuri did her best to keep her voice from squeaking. “Um. I think so? I was going to try to start it in a minute.” It was a good thing she’d finished her work, because Sigrun’s proximity was...distracting.

Especially when she grinned like  _ that _ . “Leave it for later. We don’t want to draw attention to ourselves if we’re sticking around for a while, right? And anyway, I want to show you something.” She pulled Tuuri away from the tank as though she expected a protest, but Tuuri went willingly. Whatever Sigrun wanted to show her was bound to be more exciting. Especially because Sigrun wasn’t leading her to the tank, but instead—

“Are we  _ leaving the camp?”  _ Tuuri’s hands flew up to cover her mask, and she did a little dance of glee. “Eeeeee we’re leaving the camp!”

“Yep!” Sigrun directed her down a wide street. “We checked the place out, and your cousin couldn’t detect any sign of trolls. Not as many books as we hoped, but...well, you’ll see it.” They continued in silence for a while, keeping carefully to the bright path down the middle of the street. No matter what Lalli had said, it was always a good idea to keep a low profile.

There was nothing inconspicuous about the building Sigrun stopped in front of, though. It was  _ huge,  _ bigger than all the biggest buildings in Keuruu put together. They passed through a rusty gate that seemed far too old to be meant for troll attacks, though the spikes on top would have helped. The courtyard beyond it wasn’t terribly impressive; where some of the buildings here had fountains or statues, this one had a big lump of rock on a pedestal. Tuuri shook her head as they passed. Sometimes it was obvious that the Old World had been a very different place.

The door Sigrun led her through was ordinary enough, but the space beyond it stopped her in her tracks. Light filtered in from a huge round window set in the roof, showing off patterned floor tiles and beautiful paintings all over the walls and ceiling. The colors had faded, but it was still clear that this place had been a work of art. It was well-preserved, too, with no signs of creeping damp or troll nests. 

Tuuri turned to share that last thought with Sigrun, and nearly screamed when she saw a huge skeletal face staring at her from the middle of the room. Only a lifetime of caution kept the noise from escaping her. Instead, she clutched frantically at Sigrun’s arm and pointed.

“Oh, that? Don’t worry, it’s dead.” Sigrun strode over to the skull, dragging Tuuri with her. “See? I think it was dead when they put it here, it’s just the head.” She rapped on it with her knuckles.

Now that they were closer, Tuuri saw that she was right; it was far too clean to have come there naturally. But—

“What  _ is  _ it? It looks like a troll, but who would clean up a troll skull and put it  in a building like this?” Despite the age of the skull, Tuuri was glad she had her mask on.

Sigrun grinned. “I don’t know, but this isn’t even the weirdest part. C’mon, let’s go upstairs.”

The building must have been made to last, because the stairs still held their weight easily. Tuuri stuck close by Sigrun’s side—they were still holding hands, and she wasn’t going to let go if Sigrun wasn’t—so when they entered the first room, Sigrun was close enough to hear her gasp.

“Sigrun. What  _ is  _ this place?”

The room was full of bones. That wasn’t terribly unusual; it was normal to find an Old-World building with a skeleton or two, and pretty rare to find one that was completely devoid of them. Even though she wasn’t ever allowed to go out and scout, Tuuri knew what a dead body looked like, and could recognize the various stages of decay. But these bones weren’t the sad remains of people from ninety years ago. They weren’t even human. And someone had arranged them into careful shapes, wiring them together so they towered over the explorers, empty eye sockets glaring down over mouths with far too many teeth.

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Sigrun said. She sounded calm, but Tuuri noticed that her free hand never left her sword. “Or better than mine, probably. You’re the skald, right?”

“Sure, but I’ve never seen anything like...this…” Tuuri’s mind raced, proposing and discarding possibilities. She’d heard of troll worshipping cults, but by all accounts they’d been pretty short-lived; their members tended to get eaten or infected. She also remembered that Old-World artists had used their far more abundant resources to make all kinds of bizarre sculptures. These bones seemed too real though, and arranged in a way that made her think of scientists more than artists. Plus there  _ were  _ paintings on the wall, faded but still recognizable. It seemed like someone had tried to show what the skeletons would look like with muscles and skin. And next to the picture—

“Oh, there are words!” Words she could read, though in places it was hard to connect the Danish to Swedish and then translate back into Finnish. The sign was talking about life cycles, and something about time periods—Tuuri read the numbers, blinked, and read them again. “Sigrun...I think these bones...are really old.”

“Well, yeah,” Sigrun said, leaning over to poke her sword at a group of small skeletons with horns sticking out of their skulls, “I mean, no one has lived here for ninety years, so—”

“No,” Tuuri shook her head, “I mean...this sign says these...whatever they are...lived over  _ sixty million years ago.”  _

“What?” Sigrun left off challenging the skeletons and came over to read the sign. “Huh. Well. Maybe they’re not trolls after all. Can’t see why they’d put them in a museum either way, though. If they died out that long ago, it’s kinda cheap to display their bones as trophies.”

Tuuri laughed. “Who knows. It seems like the Old World skalds had way more time to study things just for the sake of studying them. Maybe they were trying to learn something. Or maybe this is something their mages did.” It wasn’t quite like what Lalli did to send a beast’s spirit on—there was no sign any of these skulls had ever been placed in a tree—but Old World mages might have had a different way. “Anyway, we won’t figure it out just standing here. Are there more of these?”

Sigrun’s eyes lit up. “Oh, you better believe it. Come on, I saved the best one for last.”

The skeleton in the last room was so, so tall. Tuuri simply looked up at it, lost for words. Its head was so big! Those  _ teeth!  _ But—her eyes moved down its body—there was something wrong with it. 

“What’s so funny, Fuzzy-head?” Sigrun’s voice was close to her ear, and Tuuri could hear the smile in it as she laughed against Sigrun’s shoulder. 

“It’s...oh gods, whoever put this one together must not have known what they were doing...look at the  _ arms!”  _ Tuuri dissolved into helpless giggles.

After a moment, Sigrun started laughing too. “Ha! You’re right—it couldn’t kill anything with those! That head would get right in the way.” She wrapped her arm around Tuuri, holding her up as she caught her breath. “Still, it wouldn’t really need to. Teeth like that, it could just—crunch!—take a big old bite out of someone.” 

“Yeah.” Tuuri leaned into the embrace. Sigrun showed no signs of letting go, and Tuuri was glad. They might be in the middle of the Silent World, staring at impossibly old bones, but it was...nice. Hardly the weirdest date she’d been on. If that’s what this was. “Say, Sigrun...since there hasn’t been any sign of a troll, and these don’t seem to be troll bones…” 

“Yeah?”

Tuuri braced herself. “Do you think I could take the mask off? Just for a minute.”

Sigrun looked down at her. “Probably wouldn’t hurt. Why, what are you going to do? Give our toothy friend a kiss?”

Tuuri eased the mask down and smiled. “Nah. I have a better idea.” She stretched up on her toes. Thankfully, she didn’t have far to go—Sigrun met her halfway. The kiss was brief, but it sent a pleasant warmth all through her. It was, she thought, something she’d remember long after those bones became dust.

Sigrun’s chuckle came out in a warm puff of breath. “Well. I guess it was a pretty good idea, bringing you to look at these weird old bones?”

“Mmm.” Tuuri fiddled with the straps of her mask, not sure she was ready to put it back on yet. “You can take me to look at weird old bones anytime.” A glance at the sun told her that time wasn’t really on their side, though—they should get back before dark. “Now that you’ve shown me yours, can I show you mine? It’s not as exciting, but...that engine should be purring like a kitten now.”

She had to wear the mask for the walk back, of course. But with Sigrun’s hand in hers, and the memory of their lips pressed together, Tuuri felt lighter than she had in days. And when she turned the key, the engine started right up.

**Author's Note:**

> Sigrun. Sigrun please don't poke the dinosaurs with your sword, they've already been through so much.


End file.
